1. Technical Field of the Invention
This invention relates to automated classification and organization of business processes. More particularly, this invention classifies and organizes business processes in terms of a 3-dimensional process space facilitating process identification, decomposition and definition by traversal of this space.
2. Background Art
Workflow, which relates to automatically interpreted business processes, is an emerging technology closely associated with business and corporate re-engineering activities. It is considered a cross-industry paradigm for reducing business costs, improving efficiencies and fundamental to the notion of adaptive business organizations. Business processes are defined in such a way that they can be directly interpreted and executed by a workflow server. A major inhibitor to the development of workflow is understanding the mechanisms, interactions and inter-relationships of these processes, because even small business will have hundreds, as workflow matures.
As a business begins employing workflow technology it must systematically defines its current and future processes. The large number of processes and subprocesses that even a medium-sized business will have must be coherently organized so that they can be used, changed, and understood. These business processes must be related to the business organization and the roles of the people.
System providers must deliver workflow solutions that are immediately useful for customers, and yet can be readily changed and augmented by the customers for their situation. Such providers need to deliver workflow solutions in the context of existing software. Further, provision must be made for readily and directly capturing in workflow solutions the policies a business uses to guide its activities. Processes impacted by such a policy need to be immediately and readily known within an overall business context.
It is an object of the invention to provide a system method for enabling understanding of the mechanisms, interactions and inter-relationships of business processes.
It is a further object of the invention to systematically define the current and future processes of an organization in a manner which facilitates understanding, use and change.
It is a further object of the invention to provide an overall business context in which to know and evaluate processes impacted by a policy.